Hard to imagine this thing functioned properly for over three decades in space!
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Pioneer 10 falls silent after nearly 31 years LOS ANGELES, California (AP) -- Pioneer 10, the first spacecraft to venture out of the solar system, has fallen silent after traveling billions of miles from Earth on a mission that has lasted nearly 31 years, NASA said Tuesday.
What was apparently the spacecraft's last signal was received January 22 by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Deep Space Network. At the time, Pioneer 10 was 7.6 billion miles from Earth; the signal, traveling at the speed of light, took 11 hours and 20 minutes to arrive.
The signal and the two previous signals were very faint. The Deep Space Network heard nothing from Pioneer 10 during a final attempt at contact on February 7. No more attempts are planned.
Pioneer 10 was launched March 2, 1972, on a 21-month mission. It became the first spacecraft to pass through the asteroid belt and the first to obtain close-up images of Jupiter. In 1983, it became the first manmade object to leave the solar system when it passed the orbit of distant Pluto.
Although Pioneer 10's mission officially ended in 1997, scientists continued to track the TRW Inc.-built spacecraft as part of a study of communication technology for NASA's future Interstellar Probe mission. Pioneer 10 hasn't relayed telemetry data since April 27.
"It was a workhorse that far exceeded its warranty, and I guess you could say we got our money's worth," said Larry Lasher, Pioneer 10 project manager at NASA's Ames Research Center.
Pioneer 10 carries a gold plaque engraved with a message of goodwill and a map showing the Earth's location in the solar system. The spacecraft continues to coast toward the star Aldebaran in the constellation Taurus. It will take 2 million years to reach it.
There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. - Theodore Roosevelt, Ocotber 12, 1915
I remember being a mark for the Voyager I and II missions in the early 1980's. Couldn't have done those without Pioneer, though. Well done, NASA.
Sure, Pioneer jobbed to a bored Kala, waiting for a main-event match with Enterprise. But Voyager 6 (I know, I know, they only made 2. Maybe they went all Villano on us, and put new numbers on the same old dude) found a huge tag-team partner (an early generation of The Borg, according to William Shatner's novel The Return) and damn near killed Kirk and his stable in the main event of the first PPV...er, movie!
And you thought space science, wrestling, and science fiction couldn't be welded together. Pshaw!
Star wipe, and...we're out. Thrillin' ain't easy. . . THE THRILL All-Star Championship Wrestling Home Video Technical Director...& A2NWO 4 Life!
I see at least ONE of us get's some light reading done. HA!
I see a wrestling/Star Trek connection. Helmsley's Kirk, Big Show's Scotty, Brock is Worf, Trish is Beverly Crusher, Heyman and Kurt are Picard and Riker(respectivly)... this stuff just writes itself. Any others wanna chime in?
Cerebus: Barbarian, Prime Minister, Pope, Perfect House Guest.
"Graft is as necessary as throwing up when you drink too much."
Originally posted by Jeb Tennyson LundHave they ever mentioned whatever supposedly happened to "V-Ger" after it merged with Captain Decker? Or is that best left forgotten?
SHHHHHHHH!!!!
Having to sit through THAT dreck of boredom ONCE was more then enough, we certainly don't need a sequel or anything drastic like that.
Oh, and I thought they brought it up in one or two of the books, I seem to remember.
Cerebus: Barbarian, Prime Minister, Pope, Perfect House Guest.
"Graft is as necessary as throwing up when you drink too much."
Originally posted by ManiacalClownI've always thought V'Ger could be seen as the origin of the Borg. And like The Thrill said, that's what William Shatner thinks, as well.
that was my understanding as well....
I think there are crocs in the sewers. Great big honking ones...
Originally posted by ManiacalClownI've always thought V'Ger could be seen as the origin of the Borg. And like The Thrill said, that's what William Shatner thinks, as well.
Well, not quite. The Shatner novel explains it as such:
Remember when Spock stole a thruster suit in Star Trek: The Motion Picture and thrust himself deeper into V'Ger's inner chamber? (All right, stop that laughing.) As he saw all those stored images, he came across that "machine planet," remember? In the book, Spock realizes that was the Borg homeworld in the Delta Quadrant.
Data theorizes that the "black hole" Decker though V'Ger disappeared down was really a transwarp conduit. V'Ger emerged in the Delta Quadrant, near that Borg planet. From there, Spock's speech in ST: TMP kicks in: the machine inhabitants recognized V'Ger as one of its own, primitive but kindred. They discovered its rudimentary programming, and built it that big ol' ship to help it complete its programming: gather all possible data and send it back to NASA.
Therefore, those "stored images" Spock zoomed past weren't just snapshots...but stuff V'Ger encountered on its way back. It used its new Borg superpowers to assimilate those things (the 3 Klingon cruisers, the Epsilon 9 comm station) via energy patterns...instead of the physical assimilation techniques used by the Borg who got their asses kicked by Picard.
Geez, you'd think I'm a sci-fi geek or something.
Star wipe, and...we're out. Thrillin' ain't easy. . . THE THRILL All-Star Championship Wrestling Home Video Technical Director...& A2NWO 4 Life!
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You are correct Joe, Monday was Epiphany or Three Kings Day as we know it here, and it's one of the Puerto Rican traditions that have stand the test of time. Back in the day (1950's and before)